Brotherhood (Games We Play side story)
by vlalekat
Summary: COMPLETE - When Charmer spared Scribe Haylen during the Railroad's attack on the Brotherhood of Steel, she didn't plan for Haylen's feelings of loss at the death of her family. Side story to Games We Play (which is also now complete).
1. Part One

Brotherhood: Games We Play Side Story

Part One

Notes: I've kinda been kicking around the idea of seeing how Haylen deals with being the sole survivor of the Brotherhood massacre. Here goes.

* * *

The first day in Covenant, all Haylen can do is cry. If the Brotherhood could see her now, she'd be embarrassed - it's not very soldierly behavior, to lock oneself in a room any cry, but then again, she's not a soldier anymore. She doesn't know who she is, or what.

She thinks of the squires on the Prydwen; their young lives snuffed out in an instant. Even from here, halfway across the Commonwealth, she could see the explosion. It's early, no one else from the Railroad up and about, and she's been standing by the gate, trying to decide whether to leave or to stay. There's a bright light against the dawn sky - and she _knows._

The Paladin did this. That was why she told Haylen to grab Rhys and to flee; because she was planning a massacre.

Haylen drops her hand from the gate and trudges back to the small house up the hill, to the place Desdemona told her she could stay until things got sorted out. The whole way up the hill, she can feel Rhys' hand in her own,but of course he's not there.

He stayed. He died for his brothers.

Perhaps she should have done the same.

* * *

It's late in the evening when the Paladin returns. Haylen can barely open her eyes to look at the other woman, not that she wants to. There's a rustle of blankets and the mattress sinks as the Paladin sits on the bed, and Haylen keeps her eyes down, on the rough fabric of her Brotherhood-issue pants.

The silence stretches between them, a taut, hateful thing.

Finally: "I didn't want to do this."

Well, that's just the last fucking straw.

"Then you shouldn't have," Haylen hisses at her through gritted teeth, eyes flaming as she looks up at the woman she thought was her friend. Her sister.

The Paladin's face is sad, the line of her mouth tilted downwards, not in empathy but in something else. Regret? Sorrow?

Haylen doesn't give a shit.

"They attacked us first. We could have worked together but -"

"Why me?" The voice that comes out of her is unrecognizable in its harsh tone; it's laced with fury, with hatred. Where's all this coming from, a small part of her wonders. It's not like she was sure she belonged there.

 _They didn't all have to die just because I wasn't happy._

The Paladin thinks for a long moment, and Haylen begins to wonder if the other woman even understood her. Then: "I thought you might be sympathetic to our cause. That you might be an asset to the Railroad."

The laugh that barks out of Haylen is ugly, odious; when she opens her mouth she tastes salt and realizes she began crying again. Fuck - she doesn't want to look weak in front of the Paladin, and so she scrubs her eyes roughly with the back of her hand, with the coarse fabric of her sleeve.

"Why the hell would you think that?"

"Because of Danse."

Oh. It all starts to make sense now.

"You killed him," Haylen hisses, sitting up more on the bed and hand reaching for her gun automatically. At the other end of the bed, the Paladin watches her but doesn't stop her hand, doesn't say a word. "You killed him because Maxson told you to and now all of a sudden I'm supposed to believe you're some big-ass Railroad bitch who saves synths? Fuck you."

"I didn't." The Paladin's voice is quiet but calm. Must be nice to have a conscience so clear.

"Didn't what?"

"I didn't kill him." Their eyes meet, and Haylen's hand folds around her laser pistol. It'd be so easy to shoot her - but, what, wait?

"What do you mean?" She shivers involuntarily. "But Maxson said -"

"Maxson lied," the Paladin says it in the same tone. Calm, assured. "He wanted Danse dead but - well, I couldn't. Not him, not after everything he did for me. Not after...what you said."

It has to be a lie. It has to be a fabrication; all this woman knows is lies, Haylen is sure of it. She lifts the pistol, flips the safety off, and points it at the Paladin.

"I don't believe you." Her voice is steady, if not calm. She can kill in cold blood; she can avenge.

But the Paladin just sighs. She looks tired. Haylen's heard a day of mass murder can do that to you.

"Believe me or not, it's true either way. He was going to lay low at Listening Post Bravo if you want to see for yourself." She stands, stretches, and walks out the door, leaving Haylen to sit there with her pistol pointed at open air and a look of surprise on her face.

* * *

That night, she dreams of Rhys. After so many years of flirtation and long glances, they'd only been together that one time, the night after Worwick died. Danse had been on watch, and she'd been crying in the bedroom when the door creaked open. She'd been staring at her hands, wondering how she could kill one of her own, and when she heard footsteps, she'd rolled over, putting her back to the door.

She hadn't wanted anyone to see her like that.

Footsteps had approached and then there was the welcome feeling of the mattress shifting as someone sat next to her, the warmth of a back against her own. The smell of tobacco and something antiseptic, and a calloused hand on her side.

Rhys. Of all people to see her like this -

"It's okay," he'd said to her, and she'd stopped crying out of pure shock. "It's okay," he'd repeated, and for a moment she'd thought he was right; it all would be okay. She'd been so stunned, she rolled over and looked at him in the dim light. His hand had shifted, rubbing up between her shoulder blades, and she'd let out a dry, shuddering sigh, then sat up.

Their bodies had been close together; too close, really, for the fraternal relationship they were supposed to have, and when he'd looked at her, all she could see was the kindness he'd always shown her. So she'd kissed him.

When she wakes up from the dream - or is it a memory? - the bed is cold around her. She's alone again, the only one. No more brothers, no more sisters. No more Rhys to comfort her in the dark, or to laugh at her silly jokes.

It's still dark, although there's a hint of light coming from the east. Dawn. It's been almost a full day now since -

She gathers her things quickly, in silence. There's precious little of it, so she supplements with a couple cans of pork 'n' beans, a can of water, a box of Dandy Boy Apples. On a whim she stuffs an opened but barely-touched carton of Fancy Lad Snack Cakes into her bag as well, along with ammunition and a few stimpacks. Covenant isn't far; if she leaves now, she could make it to the bunker by lunchtime.

The door swings open silently and Haylen makes her way down the hill.

The Paladin stands at the gate, waiting. Waiting for her? Haylen isn't sure, but the other woman doesn't look surprised to see her.

"Going to see Danse?"

"Fuck you," Haylen says. Although she said it the day before, it still feels weird to say the words out loud. She'd never been much for cursing before; then again, she's never lost a thousand brothers and sisters in one day before. She wonders if she's spinning out of control, then decides she doesn't care.

The Paladin just opens the gate and, as Haylen steps through, stops her with a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"You have a place here, if you want it. Please...don't blame them for what I did."

Her eyes are sad again, and Haylen wants more than anything to punch her in the face, but she doesn't. Instead she turns, shoving the other woman's hand off her roughly, and starts down the road.


	2. Part Two

Brotherhood: Games We Play Side Story

Part Two

* * *

It's been over a year since she visited Listening Post Bravo. After the new Paladin's promotion, Haylen considered coming back here, though why she couldn't say. She never expected to find much - maybe a holo detailing his last hours, maybe a piece of graffiti written to memorialize that he did exist, even if he was an abomination, even if he was a lie.

She's considered coming here so, so many times over the last several months that it never occurred to her to actually do it, to set boots to ground and walk, and the last few hundred meters make her shaky, somehow. The Paladin looked so sincere when she said he was alive, that he was here, but then again Maxson had said she killed him, and he seemed so trustworthy and Haylen had always had reason to believe him.

Except, of course, about the synths. It's at that point everything Haylen knows to be true seems to unravel, no matter how much she tries to untangle it.

Well, if the Paladin lied, she resolves, she'll just have to kill the woman herself.

She walks up over the rise, her footsteps firm despite her nervousness, and when she begins walking down again, she becomes aware of the high-pitched whine of a laser turret. That's right - there were two turrets and -

The heavy step of a protectron interrupts her. Of course. Two turrets and a protectron.

She barely has time to think that maybe she should back away - or run away - before the protectron begins clomping over to her. Each footfall makes a small vibration that reminds her of the sound of a soldier in power armor approaching; each footfall makes her think again of Danse, of the way she failed him.

The way she failed Rhys; the way she failed all of them.

But the protectron approaches and though she backs away, she's not nearly fast enough; it catches up to her in a moment, and that's when something miraculous happens. It makes a clicking sound, several times, then says her name.

"Scribe Nancy Haylen," it intones in its cold, metallic voice. "Cleared for entry. Welcome home, Scribe Haylen."

Then it marches away, arms held out and making more robotic noises, leaving her gaping between two small trees.

There's a small building, a military outpost, which she remembers well. Just a doorway with the door long gone, and inside a desk and a cage for weapons and an elevator with a terminal. The elevator opens quickly after she presses the call button, and she rides down to what feels like the center of the Earth. Then, suddenly and yet after far too long, there's a ding and a whoosh of air, the doors open and she takes a step forward into the cool, clammy basement.

"Stop right there." It is Danse; she'd know his voice anywhere. She stops immediately and puts her hands up to show she's unarmed and looks around the room, trying to find him.

"Danse?" There's a quiver in her voice and she hates it, but maybe that's why he sounds so different when he answers her.

"Hay...Haylen? Is that really you?"

Somewhere to her right there's a clatter of a gun being dropped, and then heavy footsteps coming towards her. Danse appears, for once not wearing his power armor, and - and this is the real surprise, so real it literally takes her breath away - he hugs her.

He _hugs_ her. Danse - Paladin of the Brotherhood of Steel, supposedly emotionless, unfeeling synth, _dead_ man - is _hugging_ her. With his arms around her shoulders, and his broad chest against her cheek, and the scent of Abraxo and sweat and that charred smell that she always associates with laser fire.

And it's been... _so_ long since anyone touched her, hugged her, was kind to her. Even if Rhys did just bring her a fresh tato at breakfast what, three days ago? Four?

It feels like a lifetime since she had anything to hang onto, and she's just... _drowning._

Eventually Danse takes a step back and holds her at arm's length. He examines her face, and there's that faint smile in his eyes, the one that always made her wonder if she was imagining it, but it's there, it's there and it's real, and _he's_ real, and before he can stop her, she's pulled him back into another hug and she's crying.

"They're dead, Danse, they're all dead. We're the only ones left." The words are muffled by the angle of her face against his chest, but it doesn't matter; they're almost nonsense anyway, and she can't help herself, she's just _sobbing._ Everything goes a little dark for a few minutes; she doesn't fall asleep but there's a minute or two or five where all she knows is that she's here with Danse and she's not alone.

* * *

"So it was the Prydwen I saw," Danse says as they sit outside, on top of the hill that the cave structure is built into, watching the sun go down and sharing a box of extremely stale snack cakes. Haylen takes a pink-frosted one and nearly chips a tooth on it before she manages to bite off an edible portion. Nearly choking from hardened frosting, she nods.

"Yes," she says, finally able to get the sugary crust to soften enough to form words around it. "It was."

She thought she had more to say about it, but she doesn't. Her feet dangle into open air; her boots are heavy, as if they want to pull her down.

Danse, surprisingly, seems less upset than she expected.

"Well," he begins before stopping and falling entirely silent. "I -" But then he stops again. He reaches into the box, takes a white-and-chocolate frosted cake out, and takes a bite.

"I can't say I'm surprised," he finally says, swallowing a lump of cake with a gagging motion that sends his adam's apple bobbing up and down for almost a full minute. "And the Institute, they're gone too?"

Haylen nods. Her teeth feel grimy from the frosting, but she takes another bite, more for something to do than because she wants it.

"I guess I'm safe then."

This...hadn't occurred to her. Danse had told her, when they came outside with the cakes and cans of purified water, that Maxson threatened him. Told him that if any Brotherhood soldier ever saw him again, he'd be executed on the spot. And the Institute...well, she could just imagine what would happen if they had discovered one of their own gone rogue and wandering in their backyard.

"I guess you are," she says quietly. She's glad he's free, but somehow that doesn't quite seem like enough when she considers all the lives lost.

Even thinking that feels traitorous.

A sigh from Danse."I would have preferred it to be different."

Haylen nods. "Me too."

"But - well, we are here now. We can't change the past."

She turns her head slightly to look at him sidelong. It's hard to reconcile this with what she knows of him. "You don't want to, I don't know, avenge the Brotherhood?"

And Danse - he shrugs. The gesture alone shocks her, but then he does it again with another heavy sigh. "What's the point?"

"What do you mean?" She gives up on the snack cake and stuffs what's left of it back in the package. Maybe she can soften it in some coffee later.

"I know we have - had - our mission. But we both deserted -"

Haylen interrupts him with a gasp and he raises one finger towards her. She clamps her mouth shut; he's right. If she had any honor she would have stayed. She would have died with the rest of them in the police station.

"We both deserted," he starts again. "And now we have another chance, a chance to start over."

She thinks of the holotape she carries in her pack; her great shame, her lack of faith in the Brotherhood and their ideals. Danse, with his new perspective, feels like her old concerns made flesh while she stands firmly in the past, in the rigid stance of a soldier.

"But all those people - our brothers and sisters -"

Danse lays his hand on hers, squeezes gently. There's something reassuring about the gentle pressure, about the warmth of his skin. It still boggles her that he's synthetic. He's real - she would never say he wasn't, he's still a person, she's seen him _bleed_ \- but he's not...the same as she is. He's something different, and new, and confusing.

"I know." His voice is soft, not as strident as it was earlier. His face looks peaceful.

"I'm just so...angry."

"I am too."

"Then how are you so calm?"

He smiles. It's a nice smile, warm and tender and she thinks again of her big brother, somewhere down in the Dixie wasteland. She hopes he's okay. She hasn't thought of him in years, she's been so busy with the life of a field scribe.

Danse doesn't speak, though; instead he holds up his opposite hand and gestures to the sunset, to the vivid purple skies and orange glow in the distance. It is beautiful.

And so they sit, quiet in the approaching gloom, hand in hand, and Haylen considers the past and her place in the new future.


	3. Part Three

Brotherhood

Part Three

Notes: You know how sometimes something just writes itself? This percolated for like a week and then fell into place and seriously, I wrote the whole thing in about a half-hour. When it's right, it's right.

* * *

It's hard to tell what time it is in the bunker. Down here, with no windows or clocks, it could be an hour since she went to sleep, or it could be a week. Haylen hasn't slept more than seven hours at a stretch in years, since she joined up, but she has a feeling it's been much longer when she finally drifts up out of her stupor and rolls over to see Danse fiddling with a pack. He's dressed for the fall weather, with a jacket and scarf over his combat armor. It's still weird to see him out of power armor, though it makes sense - he wouldn't have been allowed to keep his suit and while it's not unusual to find unused pieces in the wasteland, she doesn't think he's left the bunker in months.

"You going somewhere?" She rolls over and stretches; her whole body is tense from lack of sleep followed by too much. There was another dream in the night, another memory of her night with Rhys, and she aches now. Longing and wistfulness course through her limbs.

She's just so fucking sad.

"It seems like it's finally safe for me to leave now." He doesn't say why, but then again he doesn't need to. If he did she might start to cry again.

"Where will you go?"

A shrug from him, as he rearranges some items in his pack. His voice is alarmingly casual when he tell her: "I was thinking I might go talk to the Railroad."

Haylen snorts, an indelicate and irritated sound. "Those assholes. Why?"

Danse looks up, meeting her eyes, and before he says anything it clicks for her. He's spent months down here, alive but not living. He needs answers, and with the Institute gone, the Railroad is his best bet for finding out where he comes from.

"I need to know who - what - I was before. I need to know about M7-97. I figure they might have answers." There's the hiss of a zipper as he closes his pack, and the finality of his motion makes her sit up, back against the wall, sleeping bag slipping to her waist. She runs a nervous hand through her hair - greasy, damp with sweat, despite the cool in here. She's glad there's no mirror and she doesn't have to see how she looks.

"I can't go with you," she says, dropping her gaze to the concrete floor. It's too raw to think about going back to Covenant. She's never lusted for revenge before.

When she looks back up, he's nodding. There's no disappointment in Danse's face, no surprise.

"I think it might be good for you, but I understand."

Haylen feels a flare of anger. Who the fuck is he to tell her what's good for her? What would be good for her is having her family back, and there's no way that's ever going to happen.

She looks down and realizes she's clenched her fists tightly into the scratchy fabric of the sleeping bag. Counting in her head, she forces her fingers to let go, to relax and smooth it down. He's probably right. She can't stay in here forever, hiding and mourning.

Besides, she owes him.

She counts to ten, then to twenty, and keeps going till she feels the frustration and the loss, the deep pit gaping in her chest, subside. The ache is still there when she gets to fifty, but by the time she hits sixty she's feeling more measured. At seventy-five, she looks up and meets his steady gaze.

"Fine," she spits, and just that one word hurts. "I'll go with you."

It's not like she was doing anything else today anyway.

* * *

The walk back to Covenant does a funny thing, where it seems to take forever but they arrive too quickly. Since she left the police station she's felt time moving in fits and starts, jumping about like a recruit in their first firefight. Haylen can't seem to focus on anything for long - every minute seems to bring a new horror to her mind, the thought of squires screaming as the ship went down, their faces on fire, or the the image of Proctor Ingram, knocked out of her power armor and trying to right herself. They come to her in the bright morning sun, unbidden and cruel and mocking.

She let everyone down, she can't stop thinking, and now she's the only one left.

The last Brotherhood of Steel in the Commonwealth, and she's a goddamn coward, a traitor.

When they arrive at Covenant, Danse asks her if she wants to go in. She gives the walls and their turrets a suspicious look and shakes her head, not trusting her mouth to form words and not sobs. He doesn't nod, just directs her to a chair out front, set back in the cool shade, and heads inside.

Haylen hadn't realized until he left how much better she feels with him. Danse makes her feel more steady, less out of control; whether because he's him or because he's a reminder of her old life she's not sure, but without him she feels like she might spin out of control.

For a moment - just a moment - she thinks of following him, but discards that immediately. The Paladin might be in there, and if she is, Haylen doesn't know if she could control herself. With the laser pistol at her hip and the combat knife in her boot she could make short work of the Paladin, given the element of surprise and the madness that seems to grip her limbs.

Best to stay outside, to watch the birds dip and dive over the lake and come up with fish clutched in their claws. The sun creeps slowly across the sky, and it's early afternoon when Danse comes back out the gate, an expression of quiet satisfaction on his face.

She'd been smoking - a bad habit she picked up from Rhys and now the only thing she has left of him - and she stands, crushing the cigarette out under her boot.

"Any luck?" With the nicotine in her brain it feels like things are smoother somehow. Weird to think that even a cigarette can get her high, but then again, she can't remember the last time she ate. Was it two days ago, the snack cakes? She hasn't been hungry.

It hasn't seemed right to eat when the rest of them are dead. It seems greedy.

"A lead," Danse says briefly, scanning her face in that way he has, the one that makes her realize she has no secrets from him.

"What is it?" Haylen pulls her pack up off the ground, smacking an errant dusting of dirt from the bottom, and pulls it on her back. It catches in her ponytail, and she pulls the hair loose. "Did someone there remember you?"

Danse starts down the road and she falls in next to him, close enough to see the twitch of his jaw before he answers her.

"No," he says, voice quiet. "They said it must have been a long time ago. Desdemona - their leader - she says they keep everything compartmentalized anyway, and if I was one they got out, I may have been...wiped. Then I would have been sent away, apparently to the Capital Wasteland."

A dead end, then. She fails to see how this is good news, how he can call this a lead.

"Then where are we going?" Under her feet the pavement is crumbling; the whole world is falling apart around her. It's nothing new but today seems packed with more bitterness than is fair, when she's lost so much.

"The doctor who would have wiped M7-97's memories -" he pauses, takes a slow breath, and she realizes he's scared. "She often has the...the synths leave a last holo. She might have something, they said, even after all this time."

"So you'd know what he thought of all this."

A nod from Danse, who doesn't look at her, but instead ahead, down the road. She knows this face; he's looking ahead, for threats, so he doesn't have to look back.

"Where is this doctor?"

"Goodneighbor."

Haylen nods absently. Behind them, Covenant drops smaller and smaller at the top of the rise, and then they pass under an overpass and it's gone. Somehow she feels like she can breathe better out of sight of that godforsaken shitheap.

"You don't have to come with me," he says, finally glancing towards her, and the bitter laugh this pulls from Haylen seems to surprise him.

"Where the hell else would I go? You're my brother. You're all the family I have left." It sounds hateful, but there it is, and his jaw twitches again as he looks back down the road. It stretches ahead of them, dusty and dark and twisting, into the ruins of the city, and she hopes the answers are ahead, or maybe she doesn't.

Either way, the walk feels right.


	4. Part Four

Brotherhood

Part Four

Notes: So the original projection was for this to run 5 chapters. Looks like it may go a bit past that. I hope no one minds and thinks they've bitten off more than they want to chew here.

* * *

She's never been to Goodneighbor before; it wasn't considered a high-priority target for Recon Squad Gladius, and so Danse had never directed them here. There was the assumption that there was nothing there but abominations, and their squad was on a recon mission, not coded for extermination, so even when the Prydwen arrived, Haylen never visited.

What a strange world she's wandered into now, though. Everywhere she looks there are ghouls. Here they own stores, they stir stew pots bubbling with amazing smells, they pass bottles around while telling stories on the benches in front of the storefronts.

Everywhere she turns there's a new wonder to see. An assaultron with the voice of a femme fatale from the old holos hawking weapons. A ghoul dressed in a colonial hat and frock coat who wanders about the town square. The most beautiful woman she's ever seen, shimmering like a siren in a glittery red gown. Haylen's head whips from one sight to another, overwhelmed, overstimulated, trying to process everything at once.

It's like the first time she set foot in the Citadel - there's so much to see and she has so little ability to understand. She finds she shrinks into herself and stands a little too close to Danse. She feels timid, small.

The people they pass give her knowing looks, and Haylen wonders if - even out of her uniform - she still gives off a whiff of the Brotherhood. She knows Danse does, with his ramrod military posture and expressionless face.

Ahead of them, the crowd parts and the ghoul in the tricorn hat and the red coat approaches. She can't tell if they separate to allow him to greet them, or because she and Danse so clearly stand out.

She looks up at Danse, at the bulk of his broad shoulders under a heavy coat, with his scarred face and the deep line worn between his thick brows, and a thought strikes her: what if the rest of the people here are synths, like him? There's a prickle at the back of her neck at the wrongness of it -

"Paladin Danse," the ghoul says with a cautious, condescending smile. The crowd murmurs, and Haylen wrenches her thoughts back to what's happening before them. Her pistol is cold on her hip, and her fingers touch it gently.

 _Just in case. Just in case._

"Mayor Hancock." Danse's tone betrays nothing. He could be any Brotherhood soldier meeting a civilian. She's not sure if she finds his stiff manner comforting or worrisome.

The ghoul lights a cigarette slowly, then allows the smoke to billow out the hole where his nose once was. Haylen feels that prickle again, that feeling of wrongness, all down her arms and legs, and it pools in her feet.

"What brings the Brotherhood of Steel to Goodneighbor?" The mayor finally says, and there's a quiver of sadness lapping at the base of Haylen's brain. "Or what's left of you, at any rate."

Something flickers across Danse's face, so fast she can't quite figure it out. The ghoul must see it too, though he stands quietly, patiently waiting for one of them to speak.

"We deserted," she blurts, surprised at herself for jumping in like this. Though given the way she's been since the news came out about Danse, well...she's not sure who she is anymore. Not all the time.

"Did you now?" Hancock turns his head a bit to fix her with a steady black gaze. She stares back, willing herself to take in every detail of his face, the stripped skin and weathered scars, the creases and glittering dark eyes. He inspects her too, and apparently deems her outburst credible. Without looking back at the crowd, he waves one hand at the citizens amassed behind them. "Stand down, boys. Show's over."

When the crowd starts to disperse, he cracks what looks like a real smile and turns back to Danse.

"Didn't see you as the type to run away."

Danse sighs a little, and she can see how, even now this pains him. "I wasn't left with a choice."

Hancock nods. Does he know? Haylen can't decide.

"And who's your lovely friend here?" The ghoul's eyes turn back to her, and she feels herself shrinking back from the strength of his gaze, the knowledge he seems to have. She counts to five, breaths out, and gives him her hand.

"Scri - I mean, Nancy Haylen, sir," she says, surprising even herself with the polite crispness of her voice. Mayor Hancock takes her hand in his and shakes it once. She finds she doesn't mind the feeling of his scratchy fingers against her own, they're warm and gentle though his grip is firm.

Maxson would have a fit, but she thinks again of how he wanted someone to execute Danse and realizes she rather likes the idea of pissing him off.

"So _civil,_ Paladin," Hancock says, and she can hear the tease in his voice as he releases her hand. "So many'a you smoothskins won't even touch a ghoul. She's a keeper."

Danse shuffles his feet, looks at the ground, then back up at the ghoul. "I don't suppose you could point me in the direction of Doctor Amari? I heard she had set up shop somewhere in town."

"Right to business, huh?" Hancock took another drag off his cigarette and turned with a gesture that they should follow. With a glance at each other, the two deserters stepped in behind him, and Haylen tried not to gawk at everyone they passed. "Amari's back here in the Memory Den."

They round a corner and there, in the fading sunset, is a huge old theater with a sign that casts pink neon onto the cobblestones below. Her breath catches in her chest - they're so close now, so close to finding answers -

"What're you looking to see the good doctor about?" Hancock asks, eyeing them both carefully. She wonders what would happen if they told him the truth. He doesn't seem like the kind of person to care what Danse is, so long as he's not an enemy. Something about that is reassuring.

Danse eyes Hancock for what feels like forever, then he inclines his head. "I'm looking for some information. About...myself."

Hancock doesn't look surprised, though he nods thoughtfully. "I thought it might be something like that. Well," he steps back, making a grand gesture to the door of the theater, the Scollay Square marquee heavy overhead. "I wish you best of luck with that."

"Thank you." There's a hint of a smile on Danse's face, and Haylen can't seem to breathe.

This is not what she thought would happen when the other Paladin - the wicked one, the one who killed them all, the Railroad bitch - had told her to flee the police station. She never thought she'd see her friend again, she never considered that someday there might be answers.

* * *

It turns out that Doctor Amari has an office in the basement of the Memory Den, a dank space with brick walls and the sound of water dripping. She is a small woman with dark hair and a brusque manner; her very being seems dismissive of them until Danse tells her what they want, and then her eyes open and she lets out an evocative, " _Oh._ M7-97."

"So you remember me." It's not a question.

"Yes." She looks at him carefully, as if seeing him for the first time since they descended into her lab. "I thought you might return one day. You...stood out."

"What does that mean?" Haylen can't stop herself from cutting in, but she needs to know what, why. She can't figure out the look on Amari's face, or why the doctor suddenly seems to want to look anywhere but at them.

"Look, I have the holotape in storage," the doctor says after a moment. She turns a pen around in her hands as if she can't hold still. "But I don't know if you should listen to it. It's very...unusual for a synth who's been wiped to return and -"

There's a long sigh from Danse, one so exhausted and heavy that it makes Haylen's chest ache.

"I think there have been enough people making decisions for me in my life."

Amari looks back up and meets Danse's eyes. Her mouth is a thin dash, the lines of it worried, and for the first time Haylen feels concern bubbling up in her.

"There are things on that tape that you may not want to hear."

"I deserve to know where I came from."

At this she backs down, nodding. "I suppose you may be right." The doctor turns and walks across the room to a neat stack of boxes. It takes her several minutes of shuffling and muttering to herself to find it, but she returns eventually with a holotape, the orange case large in her small hand. She holds it out to him in a supplicant's pose, and it comes to Haylen that the look in Amari's eyes is one she hasn't seen much.

She's asking for forgiveness.

Danse can't seem to make his arm move out to take the tape, and for a moment Haylen wonders if this was all a mistake.

"Danse?" He turns and looks at her, and for the first time she sees the white ring around his eyes, the tension in his shoulders. He's terrified. "We don't have to take it, you know."

This seems to settle him; his breathing slows, and even though they don't seem to change, his eyes are less wild. His hand lifts and he takes the tape from the doctor with a gentle grip. Her hand falls to her side and she seems to deflate somehow.

"Yes, I do." He stuffs it in the pocket of his jacket and nods to Amari. "Thank you."

She blinks once, slowly, and lets out a slow breath. "We'll see how you feel after you listen to that."

Danse heads up the stairs, his heavy tread made more so by the new burden he carries. Haylen gives the doctor one last look.

"Is it that bad?"

The doctor shrugs. "That will depend on who he is now."


	5. Part Five

Brotherhood

Part Five

* * *

Despite his impatience to know more about himself, Danse doesn't listen to the tape immediately. They spend the night at the Rexford. Danse gives Haylen and spends the night in the chair across the room - or so he says, but she watches him get up and pace several times in the night, the half-rotten floorboards creaking as he walks from the chair to the window and back. Neither of them get any sleep, and when dawn breaks through the half-boarded window it brings with it the relief that it's light enough out for them to leave.

Haylen doesn't feel like eating; she packs her bag in a few minutes and then they're leaving Goodneighbor behind. She doesn't know where they're going but somehow it seems wrong to ask, and she's not sure she cares much anyway.

It's cold this morning, colder than it's been since their recon team arrived back in the early spring. Once they clear the worst of the ruins and cross the bridge, she can see lacy frost on the rusted cars still sitting in the roadways, white patterns on orange decay.

They walk in silence most of the day, though it's not uncomfortable. Danse seems to be happy enough to have her along. Late in the afternoon they pass the turnoff to the bunker and Haylen grinds to a halt. It's only at this point that Danse stops as well. He wear an expression different from any she's ever seen on him before.

He looks...nervous.

"I don't know if I can go back there," Haylen says, and he nods, though his face gives nothing away.

"We don't know what's on this tape," he tells her, and she knows he's right, but the idea of going back there, to those - _people,_ the ones who murdered everyone, destroyed everything -

It sends Haylen into a nosedive of rage where everything around her seems red. She clenches and unclenches her fists, trying to understand how he can ask this of her.

"I can't," she says stubbornly, unable to move forward, legs rooted into the ground like tree trunks.

"I have to know," he says finally. "I really want you to be there, Nancy."

The use of her first name makes her feel like her skin is cracking apart, as if all the gooey soft things inside her will go flying everywhere. She takes a deep breath, closing her eyes, and then lets it out, counting 1, 2, 3.

When she opens her eyes again, he's still looking at her steadily, his eyes creased at the corners in a way that she knows means he's scared, that he doesn't want to be alone.

"Fine," she says, taking another deep breath. And then the most remarkable thing happens - Danse reaches out one hand to her, and she places one of her tense hands back in his. They walk like this for awhile, each holding the other up, until they come across the big gates of Covenant in the sunset.

* * *

The woman the Railroad calls Charmer but who - to Haylen - will always be the Paladin is not at Covenant. Desdemona says she's off tracking down a group of synths that escaped when the Institute fell with the purpose of escorting them to Sanctuary or another settlement. Haylen thinks it's just as well, and finds she feels less stiff knowing that the Paladin won't be showing her traitorous face.

Desdemona leads them to the office at the back of the settlement and gestures for them to sit. Danse takes a place on the couch and Haylen sits in the armchair, facing the door, one jumpy hand on her pistol.

Just in case, she tells herself. Danse, for all he looks uncomfortable, seems to trust these people, but Haylen doubts she'll ever be able to.

Desdemona sets a holotape player on the coffee table between them and sits on the opposite end of the couch from Danse, her eyes wide and watchful. When Danse goes to pick up the machine, she speaks.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" It's a good question, but one that makes Haylen nervous again. How bad is it going to be, if everyone keeps asking them that?

This thought she keeps to herself.

"I wish...I wish everyone would quit asking me that." His voice is quiet, tense, and Haylen's heart aches with the urge to reach out to him, to provide whatever measure of comfort she can. He looks so resolute and sad that her chest feels tight.

"Fair enough," Desdemona says, leaning back a bit in her seat. The couch cushions release a puff of dust.

Danse inserts the tape but doesn't press play. He holds the player in his scarred hands, frowning at it. His face is screwed into an expression Haylen is familiar with; the last time she saw it was when he ordered her to release Worwick.

The memory constricts her throat, and Haylen worries she won't be able to breathe. She counts to three again, and finds it easier.

"Did we meet? When I was...when the Railroad picked me up?" He doesn't look at Desdemona when he speaks, and Haylen watches the other woman for a clue.

"We did," Desdemona finally allows. "I was part of the team that brought you in."

"And I wanted to go?"

"You were ready." This doesn't answer the question, but no one points that out to her.

Danse presses play.

The tapes turn, and for what feels like an age, there's nothing but the sound of the tape running, the ancient holotape player squeaking as it loosens up, and then there's the sound of Danse's voice - or, is it M7-97's?

"I don't know what I'm supposed to say." The tenor of his voice is the same, but the tone is different; he sounds lost, scared, disgusted.

"You don't have to do this if you don't want to." This is, unmistakably, Desdemona's voice. Both Danse and Haylen turn their heads to look at her, and a surge of gratitude works its way through Haylen's body, though she doesn't know why.

"Some synths prefer to say something before they're wiped," Dr. Amari says, her accent giving her away, her manner soft and forgiving. Sympathetic.

A grunt, probably from him. Then: "My unit designation is M7-97. I am - I was created by the Institute to be a Courser. I have...killed. Many people, synths and humans alike." His voice isn't the business-like bark she associates with him. It sounds almost timid, and something about that makes Haylen ache more than the words themselves.

The tape squeaks and continues.

"I came to the attention of the Railroad after a...I guess you could call it a massacre, at Oberland Station. A rogue synth was there. Called himself Lang, Henry Lang. There was a glitch in his programming and he murdered his wife. I was dispatched and things went wrong."

"You don't have to talk about this if you don't want to." Desdemona again, her voice more gentle than Haylen's yet heard it. The woman herself reaches over and lays one hand on Danse's, though they both sit, staring at the holotape player.

Across the room, hand on her gun, all Haylen can think is that she should be the one to comfort him, but she can't move. She's his only family, and all she can do is wonder just how many people he's killed.

"The settlement is...it's gone. And it's my fault. I was unable to activate the recall code on X7-01 and the settlers got in the way. It's my fault they're dead." Improbably it sounds like he's crying. The voice is thick with emotion, heavy, and Haylen discovers she's crossed her arms and is squeezing her elbows. It feels like if she were to let go, she'd shatter apart. She can't take her eyes off Danse, off the way he watches the tape turn.

"I couldn't stop him in time," Danse says. "I didn't do my duty. I deserve...I deserve to be wiped. This unit malfunctioned."

It sounds so much like him it hurts; not just his voice, but the choice of words, the way he speaks. The cadence is the same. The talk of duty -

"I have chosen to be wiped, to forget. The Railroad is going to take me to -"

"Uh, sorry, M7," Dr. Amari cuts in. "I'm afraid for your safety, we cannot record the plans for you."

"Of course," he says. "They're going to give me a new life. I suppose it will be like dying."

"I hear it's like falling asleep." Desdemona again. Across the room, she squeezes Danse's hand. He is still, unnaturally so, like he's been frozen in place. Haylen looks up at him, at the way he sits staring at the tape turn around and around.

"When I wake up, I'll be someone else. And then somewhere else. And I can forget this ever happened. There were just -" his voice breaks and the tape turns a couple more revolutions before he begins to speak again, still in that thick, pained tone. "There were just so many people. Dead, because of me. Because I failed. Children, and - this is better. This is better than I deserve."

The tape clicks off. The three of them sit, silent, for an eternity.

Finally, Danse turns to Desdemona. "Thank you," he says.

"Are you going to be okay?" It should be Haylen asking this question, but she's still too stunned to say anything, or even move. She sits in her corner, stuck to the chair as if with WonderGlue. She feels distant, somehow, as if she were floating above the room and watching it all unfold.

He'd just been in so much pain. She could hear it in his voice, and she can hear it now when he answers.

Her brother. The only family she has left.

They saved him. No matter how much she hates the Railroad, part of her will never forget that they gave her this gift, this man who's meant so much to her.

"I needed to hear it." Danse goes quiet, then turns to Desdemona. His face is calm, but it's clear he's thinking. "So it was you who sent me to the Commonwealth."

Desdemona nods. "This must have been...oh, seventy-five? Maybe seventy-four, even? We sent a lot of synths down there then, the lines were fairly clear and no one knew about the Institute. It was easy to place a new resident or two, and the contact we had near Rivet City was excellent."

"Why...why didn't you give me more?"

"What do you mean, more?"

But Haylen understands the question, knows what he wants, and before he can speak, she jumps in. "You created him, his life, his memories. Why not a happy childhood, or a family? Why did you give him so little?"

At this Desdemona frowns, a pained and tragic thing. "Our technology was much more primitive then. The Memory Den was very new, and Dr. Amari's work was...less developed. We did the best we could at the time, but creating a new identity is very difficult and it was even harder back then. I am sorry."

Haylen sits back in her seat, unsatisfied but knowing that what Desdemona says is likely true. That would have been thirteen, maybe even fourteen years ago. A lot has probably changed since then.

"Thank you," Danse says, nodding at Desdemona. "For helping me, and for listening now. It was enlightening."

She squeezes his hand one last time, her small, pale one out of place against his scarred skin.

"I will always be glad to help you if you need me." Desdemona pulls back from him, sighs, and stretches. "If you two need some time, you're welcome to spend the night. Dinner is at seven."

When she leaves, and it's just the two of them again, Haylen tries to figure out what's happening behind Danse's eyes. She fails; he's drawn into himself, mulling over what they've learned, and she's left at a loose end. Finally, she tries:

"So what do we do now?"

He drags his eyes off the holotape player, still held in his hands like a live bomb, up to hers. He gives a heavy sigh, hits the release on the player, and pulls the tape out. Stores it away in his pocket, and stands.

"I guess we go to dinner." And so they do.


	6. Part Six

Brotherhood: Games We Play Side Story

Part Six

* * *

Dinner was a surprisingly festive affair. Haylen didn't want to go, had resisted despite the way her stomach rumbled at the smell of boiled mirelurk with corn, at the cold tato salad and the mutfruit pies. But Danse wants to go, and she doesn't want to leave him alone with these people who wiped him once and left him in the Capital wasteland to die, so she follows him down the hill to the center of the settlement where tables have been set up.

Night falls in that lazy way that late summer has; the sky stays bright even with the sun gone, and her plate is filled by a small boy with dark hair. Danse brings her a beer, and Haylen debates drinking it but it's so cool in her hand and it's been so long since she had one that she gives in. It's cool going down and she can already feel her body relaxing.

Some of the Railroad people bring out instruments – a fiddle, a mandolin, a guitar, a cello. Haylen's heard of these things though the only one she's ever seen or heard before is the fiddle. Her brother had one when they were growing up, a worn and tired old thing that he loved more than anything or anyone else, and she remembers the way it sounded when he tried to play.

The thin young man in the hat – some people call him Alex, others, Drummer Boy – is talented with it, his fingers flying over the strings and the bow moving with him as he gets into the tunes they play. Desdemona gets into it, even, standing with the group and singing. Her voice is rich and quiet, less strident than when she speaks, and somewhere between her third and fourth beer Haylen realizes she's never heard anything quiet so beautiful.

At her side, Danse wears a small, surprising smile. She puts her hand over his and he glances at her but says nothing, nodding his head along with the music.

She wants to ask him if he's ok, if he can handle what he knows now, but he seems so calm that the question dies in her throat; she'd rather not offend him by treating him like he doesn't know himself. And he really does look happy.

The people – she can't tell who are synths and who are human – get up and fill plates. They drink beer and lemonade, they dance. The boy who filled Haylen's plate comes around to collect her dirty dish, and she gives him a tense smile that he returns more widely and genuinely than she could have thought possible.

Behind the impromptu band there is a light on in the clinic. It draws Haylen's attention because the door opens and she realizes someone is going in there. Her heart skips a beat when the light through the door drifts out and Haylen realizes whose face she's looking at: the Paladin. The same broad, upturned nose, the small head and the loose ponytail. She debates with herself for a moment, then Haylen gives Danse's hand a squeeze before she gets up and walks through the dancers, around the band, and up the stairs into the clinic.

The door swings shut behind her with a quiet click. Across the small house stands a tired-faced doctor who looks as though someone just passed gas and the Paladin, her back straight even though her eyes are ringed in purple bags. Past the two of them lies a man on a gurney, an unremarkable white guy who's clearly in a coma, judging from the number of primitive machines they've hooked him up to.

"Please, doctor – there's nothing more you can do tonight." The Paladin looks so sad that for a moment Haylen forgets to hate her. She knows that face, knows the expression of someone who's being forced to make an impossible choice.

"I'm not sure there's anything I can do at all, tonight or otherwise." The doctor doesn't look particularly upset by this idea, and that works at Haylen's nerves like a splinter. He could at least sound upset about it. She thinks again of Worwick, of the way he lay like this before she put him down, and she realizes what she's walked into.

"I can't make that decision. Not yet." The Paladin's voice is final, firm.

"Charmer, I know you – but it might be more humane."

"Go get some dinner, doctor." There's no arguing with her, and the doctor turns and walks sullenly up the stairs, brushing past Haylen on his way out. She watches him go; when she turns back, the Paladin is sitting beside the bed, head hanging, with one of the man's hands between her two smaller ones.

That pang hits Haylen again, between the ribs and sneaky as a thief. She should be glad to see her hurting, to know the mass murderer is suffering, but –

The Paladin was a friend to her first, and whatever else Haylen is, she's a medic first.

She realizes, suddenly and achingly, that she's seen enough death. Killing the Paladin won't make her feel any better.

It won't bring the scribes back, or Proctor Ingram, or Paladin Brandis.

Just like that, something in her breaks, and Haylen takes three heavy steps to the stairs, barely registering as the Paladin turns to look at her. She sits slowly and finally turns to look at the Paladin next to her, just barely taller than her when Haylen sits on the second step. She's forgotten how small the woman is, or maybe she's shrunk in her grief.

Because grief it is; it's etched in every exhausted line in her face, and despite herself Haylen wants to hug her, to tell her it'll be okay even if it won't.

 _We were friends once. Sisters._

 _Maybe we can be again._

"Friend of yours?" Haylen gestures to the man on the bed, though she knows from the worried set of the Paladin's mouth that it's more than that.

The Paladin nods, turning her dark eyes back to the man's face. It's still except for the flutter of his eyelids. If Haylen were going to put a bet on it, she'd say that's a good sign; it means his brain is still active. Which means there's still someone in there.

"What happened?"

Tears, fat and salty, slip down the other woman's cheeks. Haylen never thought she'd see her cry; the sight of it is surprising and again, that pain hits her in the ribs.

Before she knows what she's doing, she reached out and taken the other woman's hand in her own, same as she did outside with Danse. The Paladin flinches, eyes darting to Haylen's face, and then she relaxes.

"It was…in the Institute." She looks down at her lap, more tears coming out of her eyes. Her words are slow but her voice is surprisingly steady. "There were just – so many gen ones. He got in the way. They were trying – trying to -"

She breaks down, her shoulders shaking as she drops the man's hand. Haylen reaches out, pulling the Paladin to her, the woman's face in her shoulder, her tears dampening Haylen's shoulder, but soothing noises are coming out of her mouth and the Paladin is crying, really crying as if the world has ended. She's saying she's sorry, and she's talking about how she loved him, although it doesn't sound as if she means the man on the bed.

Haylen doesn't have to know what's going on to care; she doesn't have to like what the Paladin did to want to soothe her. Somehow she finds she can feel all these things at once.

Some time later the woman in her arms calms, and Haylen pulls back. The Paladin's face is blotchy and red, pale in spots and streaked from crying. She wipes her eyes and nose with the back of her hand and Haylen gives her shoulder a squeeze before letting her go.

"Paladin?"

The woman looks back at her, her eyelids heavy with exhaustion. "It's just Momoko, Haylen. I'm not a Paladin, not anymore."

"Momoko, then," Haylen starts again. She swallows. "Why did you do it?"

"The Brotherhood?"

"No – I know why you did that, even if I think you were wrong. No, I want to know why you spared me."

Momoko sighs, fiddling with the zipper on her jacket.

"Because of Danse," she says finally. "Because you came to me and asked me to spare him, and I knew you had doubts about the Brotherhood and their methods. And…because of Rhys." She looks up at Haylen and at the sound of his name she feels something constrict in her chest.

"Because of Rhys?"

"Because you loved him. I knew if you could love another person, you could move on. You'd have a future. You were…the only person I met in the Brotherhood who seemed to have that, except for Danse."

Haylen nods, turning this over in her head. Finally, she unzips a pocket on her jacket and pulls out the syringe she's been saving. It's something she found in the first aid kid in the bunker.

"Here," she says, pressing it into the Paladin's – Momoko's – hand. Carefully she curls the woman's fingers over it. "I don't know how much this will help, but it's an experimental serum I found, supposed to be even stronger than a stimpack. Maybe it can help him."

Momoko looks from Haylen to the syringe then back up to her. "Why would you give this to me? After everything – that I –"

The question plagues her too, now that Haylen's given it to her, though she has no doubt it's the right thing to do. They stand there staring at each other for a full minute and finally Haylen shrugs.

"The Brotherhood might be gone, but you're still my sister."

Surprisingly enough, it's true.

* * *

Dawn comes early, and with it the first hint of autumn in the air. It's just after sunrise when Haylen steps out of the guesthouse and finds Danse sitting on the bench there, a cup of coffee wrapped in his hands. She sits beside him, her knee bumping his, and he turns to smile at her.

"So how are you doing?"

"I could ask you the same question." How is he so calm? His whole world has come crashing down and yet, there he sits, cool as a cucumber and enjoying a cup of coffee. She bites back a snicker at the absurdity of it.

"I think…" she sighs, breathing in the crispness of the air. "I think I'm going to be okay."

Danse nods, slurps some coffee. Around them the settlement is silent but for the clicking of the turrets.

"So what do we do now?"

"Well I don't know about you," he starts, then stops with a pause that stretches tentatively between them. "I'd like to go back to the Capital wasteland for a while."

Haylen turns, surprised; this isn't what she expected at all. "Not back to the Brotherhood?" She thinks of the small contingent left at Adams Air Force Base. If they know the truth of him he'll be shot on sight; Haylen finds the thought overwhelming and when he shakes his head her heart starts to beat again.

"No," he wraps his hands around the coffee cup and looks into the dark liquid. "No, that chapter of my life is done. Even if they would take me back I can't – those aren't my ideals anymore."

She's shocked, so stunned he could probably knock her over with a puff of breath. She's harbored her own doubts about the mission for so long but to hear them come out of Danse –

Across the way the door to the clinic opens. The doctor steps out, stretching and yawning. He gives them a look then pointedly ignores them. The town is coming to life around them, but there's nothing here for her. She has no place with these people.

"Can I go with you?"

Danse turns to her, looking up. His eyes are dark, deep. He stares at her and she stares back, willing him to understand that she has no place in the Commonwealth, not without him.

Finally, he smiles.

"I'd like that, sister."

The smile crosses her face before she can really register his words. The clinic door opens again, swinging shut with a bang, and the Paladin crosses the yard without looking back. Before them, the great gates of Covenant open long enough to allow Momoko to leave.

Later, they'll pack their bags and check their gear. They'll begin making their way south, hugging the coastline to avoid the Glowing Sea, and they'll have to fight their way through ferals and raiders just as they did going north. They'll forage for food and walk in rain and in sun, and maybe they'll come across a settlement that looks right for them. But for now, Haylen relaxes back into the bench and rests her head on Danse's broad shoulder.


End file.
